What's the difference between confidence and credulity?

Confidence


Definition:

  • (n.) The act of confiding, trusting, or putting faith in; trust; reliance; belief; -- formerly followed by of, now commonly by in.
  • (n.) That in which faith is put or reliance had.
  • (n.) The state of mind characterized by one's reliance on himself, or his circumstances; a feeling of self-sufficiency; such assurance as leads to a feeling of security; self-reliance; -- often with self prefixed.
  • (n.) Private conversation; (pl.) secrets shared; as, there were confidences between them.
  • (n.) Trustful; without fear or suspicion; frank; unreserved.
  • (n.) Having self-reliance; bold; undaunted.
  • (n.) Having an excess of assurance; bold to a fault; dogmatical; impudent; presumptuous.
  • (n.) Giving occasion for confidence.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) When pooled data were analysed, this difference was highly significant (p = 0.0001) with a relative risk of schizophrenia in homozygotes of 2.61 (95% confidence intervals 1.60-4.26).
  • (2) Confidence is the major prerequisite for a doctor to be able to help his seriously ill patient.
  • (3) Men who ever farmed were at slightly elevated risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (odds ratio = 1.2, 95% confidence interval = 1.0-1.5) that was not linked to specific crops or particular animals.
  • (4) Although, it did give me the confidence to believe that my voice was valid and important.
  • (5) But Howard added that it may take a while and he is not confident the political reality will change.
  • (6) Jaczko's appearance was the second show of confidence in the nuclear industry since Sunday.
  • (7) Subjects in the highest quartile of the insulin distribution had 6.6 times the risk of developing type II diabetes as subjects in the remaining three quartiles combined (95% confidence interval [CI] = 3.14-13.7).
  • (8) However, self-efficacy (defined as confidence in being able to resist the urge to drink heavily) assessed at intake of treatment, was strongly associated with the level of consumption on drinking occasions at follow-up.
  • (9) As Heseltine himself argued, after the success of last summer's Olympics, "our aim must be to become a nation of cities possessed of London's confidence and elan" .
  • (10) The adjusted odds ratio of having one or more hospitalization for current drinkers relative to life-long abstainers in females was 0.67 (95 per cent confidence interval 0.57-0.79) and in males was 0.74 (0.57-0.96).
  • (11) "There is sufficient evidence... of past surface temperatures to say with a high level of confidence that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years.
  • (12) She has imbued me with the confidence of encouraging other girls to dream alternative futures that do not rely on FGM as a prerequisite.
  • (13) The changes are necessary to produce confident, supportive community oriented nurses.
  • (14) The relationship between certain prenatal and background variables and maternal confidence also was assessed.
  • (15) Central assessment of the angiograms revealed a patent infarct-related artery in 78 patients (patency rate 66%, 95% confidence limits 57 to 74%).
  • (16) We need to be confident that the criminal justice system takes child abuse seriously.
  • (17) Twellman has steadily grown in confidence as he settles into his role, though whether as a player or as an advocate he was never shy about voicing his opinions.
  • (18) We are confident that the European commission’s state aid decision on Hinkley Point C is legally robust,” a spokeswoman for Britain’s Department of Energy and Climate Change said last week.
  • (19) By 1988, nearly one-half of the public expressed confidence in the future of the Social Security program.
  • (20) In confidence rape, the assailant is known to some degree, however slight, and gains control over his victim by winning her trust.

Credulity


Definition:

  • (n.) Readiness of belief; a disposition to believe on slight evidence.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) When President Obama stands up and says - as he did when he addressed the nation in February 2011 about Libya - that "the United States will continue to stand up for freedom, stand up for justice, and stand up for the dignity of all people", it should trigger nothing but a scornful fit of laughter, not credulous support (by the way, not that anyone much cares any more, but here's what is happening after the Grand Success of the Libya Intervention: "Tribal and historical loyalties still run deep in Libya, which is struggling to maintain central government control in a country where armed militia wield real power and meaningful systems of law and justice are lacking after the crumbling of Gaddafi's eccentric personal rule").
  • (2) With much of the work supposed to be completed by December, it is stretching credulity to believe that much more than token consultations with patient groups can take place.
  • (3) This leads to the paradoxical result that some of our most famous and successful journalists are also the profession's most credulous sycophants.
  • (4) When 11,000 jobs and a lot of pensions are at risk over the collapse of the ailing store group from which he extracted £586 m, let’s not waste any more time on King Phil (I’ve informally stripped him of his knighthood), his hurt feelings or embarrassingly vulgar yachts, except to say that – yet again – that Tony Blair was a credulous sucker for a rich man with tax-shy habits.
  • (5) It doesn't exactly stretch credulity, however, to recognize that banks provide bonuses to the best producers – whether they produce derivatives, mortgages or foreclosures.
  • (6) Given the inertia on even the most modest legislative response to the mass murder of schoolchildren, those still credulous enough to believe that our governance is representative of popular will are either Barnum-sized suckers, or worse, tacit participants in tragedies soon to come.
  • (7) Credulous voters will agree and feel placated, but in actuality, such measures will make little if any difference.
  • (8) The Crown Prosecution Service should not be so credulous in future.” But the CPS expressed satisfaction with the outcome of the trial.
  • (9) I think he’s a dangerous manchild with an army of credulous misogynists at his disposal.
  • (10) Pretending that the government's current forecasts and plans are certain and reliable, when the ones made only three years ago turned out to be anything but, stretches credulity.
  • (11) What we see is not meritocracy at work at all, but a wealth grab by a nepotistic executive class that sets its own salaries, tests credulity with its ridiculous demands, and discovers that credulity is an amenable customer.
  • (12) The boy insists he is not among the stone-throwers, an assertion that stretches credulity.
  • (13) It strains credulity to accept that a secretary of state who handles all her communications on a home-brewed server never passed classified information,” Fiorina said.
  • (14) Hague's campaign included parading Kaminski before the Jewish Chronicle and the more credulous blogger Iain Dale at the party conference: Dale's interview is reprinted across five pages in Total Politics , of which Lord Ashcroft owns 25%.
  • (15) The pirate's credulity regarding the US authorities' bogus ransom negotiations may make for a happy ending, but it's also the moment when America's superpower seems almost tragically all-consuming.
  • (16) Kiev's police chief later claimed that he ordered the assault, but that strains credulity.
  • (17) That suggestion, which always appeared unsatisfactory, now stretches the bounds of credulity.
  • (18) Equally credulous were those who, on the Monday evening, circulated reports that rioters had broken into London Zoo – thanks largely to a single, poorly-lit picture of what appears to be a tiger on a stairwell , with the irresistible subject line: "Oh my god – reports of tigers roaming around Primrose Hill."
  • (19) But the manipulation does not just tell us how sly operators view the credulous masses, but how they see themselves.
  • (20) Ghosts are not phantoms floating on the periphery of village life, the concern only of children and the credulous.